


Lay Down Your Burdens

by redredribbons



Category: Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Character Death, M/M, Sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-16
Updated: 2014-04-16
Packaged: 2018-01-19 13:58:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,039
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1472407
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/redredribbons/pseuds/redredribbons
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Now that Megatron has abandoned the Decepticon insignia, Tarn must carry out the most difficult mission of his life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lay Down Your Burdens

**Author's Note:**

> Please be aware that this fic contains spoilers for the MTMTE/Dark Cybertron comics (albeit fairly well known ones).

The door chime sounded. 

Tarn ignored it. He stared out the sizable window of his personal quarters on board the Peaceful Tyranny and caught a glimpse of his masked reflection in the glass. For the first time in vorns, he wondered what his faceplates looked like beneath it. He couldn’t remember. 

“Tarn,” Kaon’s voice wafted through the intercom. 

No response. The DJD leader’s fuel tank heaved. He hadn’t taken any energon today, and was glad of the fact. 

“Tarn. We have the— prisoner in custody,” Kaon said, his voiced pinched. Defeated. 

“Very well,” Tarn finally rasped. There was no sense in delaying the inevitable, in prolonging the suffering. 

The door slid open to reveal Kaon’s tiny, hunched frame. His thin hands folded over each other again and again and the electrical coils on his shoulders sparked erratically. The lower edges of his empty optic sockets shone with moisture. Tarn steadied himself against the doorframe. This was real, then. 

“How did you—” Tarn’s voice dissolved into static. He reset his vocalizer and started again. He didn’t know why, but he had to know. “How did you capture him?”

“The Autobots made it easy,” Kaon said softly, “They handed him over. A few dissented, but they got shouted down.”

Kaon involuntarily reached out to lay a hand on Tarn’s plating, seeking its warm, steady hum for comfort. 

“They subdued him… I don’t think he expected… I think he thought…” the smaller mech trailed off. 

Tarn didn’t prompt him to continue. Another wave of nausea flooded his systems. The world spun, and he staggered on his feet. The Autobots had deceived their prisoner… It was the type of morbid irony Tarn might’ve previously found amusing. Not that such a small betrayal mattered anymore. Not next to the betrayal committed by the prisoner. The Autobots’ act was a slight; the prisoner’s, a silent, black claw around Tarn’s spark that had grown tighter and tighter and now, with no more room to hope, it closed, leaving only a hollow shell of a frame. 

The touch against Tarn’s plating grew fluttery and frenetic as Kaon asked, “Are you alright?”

Tarn didn’t answer. He focused straight ahead on nothing, optics dim and glassy, finding his way to the brig by cable-memory alone. Vos, Helex and Tesarus clustered at the entrance to the interrogation room, silent with down-cast optics. They looked guilty even though they’d followed Tarn’s orders to the letter, as always. The tank avoided optic contact with them; they were betrayed, too. There was nothing he could say to them. No stirring words of inspiration, no rousing missive of hope. Words had abandoned Tarn, scattered and sunk into the void in his chest. He reached up to activate the door controls and watched his hand shake. 

The door hissed open. Kaon clung tightly to Tarn’s side. The larger mech gently pried him away. “Not this time, Kaon. Not this time.”

Tarn stepped inside, alone. The door hissed shut behind him. Strapped to the plain, metal table in the center of the interrogation room was Megatron. Tarn choked down a dry sob. Megatron’s head snapped up, optics glowing as fiercely as ever, fists clenching as his arms strained against the restraints. 

“Tarn,” the tyrant ordered, eerily calm, “Release me at once.”

For a moment the tank froze as the that gravelly voice washed through his audios; it was a voice he’d heard far too little of, especially in person. He fought the urge to drop to his knees. A bubble of passion swelled inside him, then burst just as quickly.

“My Lord,” Tarn said, forcefully bending the words to calm clarity. He would not waver in front of Megatron. He slid a small metal chair close to the warlord’s prone form and seated himself. 

“ _Let me go_ ,” Megatron growled low, “Are you disobeying your master, Tarn?”

“My master…” the tank murmured, “…is gone.”

Megatron’s optics flickered in confusion as his most loyal of followers began to eulogize.

“My master was… a vessel for a great Cause. The Cause filled him, and he lived it and dreamed it and spoke it. He carried it within him, his very spark a shining beacon, lighting the way for all,” Tarn’s voice soared, “It was a vision of a Cybertron so pure and perfect as to seem unattainable, but in the hands of my master… all things were possible.”

Tarn gazed down at Megatron’s chiseled, scarred faceplates— always so regal, so dignified. 

“The Cause… my master… these things were one and the same. They gave us hope. They gave us a  _purpose_. They gave me…” Tarn’s voice hitched. He paused for a long time. 

“Your processors are malfunctioning,” Megatron said darkly, a note of warning creeping into his voice. 

“And now, the vessel is empty!” Tarn cried out as if he’d been physically struck. His optics fell on the loathsome red symbol in the center of Megatron’s chest, starkly illuminated by the overheard lights. In that moment he burned with rage— rage at the symbol and all that it stood for, rage at those who wore it… Rage at the supine form on the table. Rage at his betrayal. Megatron stared into his soldier’s blazing optics, bewildered and, for the first time in a long time, uneasy. 

“My master trusted me with a mission, many vorns ago,” Tarn said, balling his trembling hands into fists on the edge of the table, “A mission of critical importance… A mission he held close to his spark. He— he trusted me… to carry out this mission under any circumstances, even the most grave.”

“Yes, Tarn, I remember the mission that  _I myself_  charged you with,” Megatron hissed, jostling his restraints. 

“Then you know…” Tarn’s voice cracked, roughened.

“Know what? Why I’m chained to this table like I’m sort of…”

“Traitor!” Tarn snapped out a brittle cry.  

“The war as we once knew it,” Megatron snarled, “Is  _over_. 

“Then what of Cybertron! What of our enemies? What of peace…”

“…through tyranny,” Megatron finished, tired, “We must bide our time. Choose our battles.”

Emboldened by despair, Tarn roared in anguish and raked his blunt fingertips over the offensive insignia on Megatron’s chest, as if it would scratch away, as if he could peel it back and reveal, once again, simplicity and meaning. The red brand didn’t smudge. Frantic movements tapered to soft pawing, then stilled. Hand splayed over Megatron’s spark, Tarn listened. His specially-tuned audio sensors calibrated, and then he heard it: the radiant hum of Megatron’s spark, the vibrant thrumming of life force through the powerful frame on the table. 

“You chose,” Tarn whispered. 

Then, he began to hum quietly. His vocalizer modifications switched on, relaying information to his HUD; one oscillating line, the frequency of his voice. A second line, the frequency of Megatron’s spark. He adjusted the pitch and volume as if he were warming up for a song. Until finally…

_There_. 

The two waves aligned perfectly, one canceling the other out. 

Megatron flinched. The tyrant had endured extremes of physical pain that few mechs could fathom— but this gentle death, fading from the inside out, was another matter entirely. From what Tarn had witnessed, it wasn’t painful per se— simply… strange. Utterly alien. And horrifying; the slow guttering of a spark like a flame deprived of oxygen. 

“Tarn. Stop,” Megatron said, voice no less commanding. 

The DJD leader brushed his knuckles down Megatron’s rough cheek in a lover’s touch. And he spoke the verses of young energon miner. Tarn had the entirety of his Lord’s works committed to memory, and he began with the earlier poems. These were rough exercises in verse, some raw and angry, others tender and introspective. 

On the table, Megatron’s mouth opened, then shut again. Whatever words he intended died on his lips as his spark began a sickly flutter in its casing. The writings grew increasingly focused and passionate in nature, and with them, Tarn’s recitation. His voice rang clear like the toll of a bell, optics focused far away from Megatron. Tirades against the excesses of the Golden Age. Exhaustive detailing of the Senate’s hypocrisies. Visions for a new age of prosperity and equality. Megatron wheezed, vocalizer spraying static in another failed attempt at speech, and his optics flared bright. His jaw clenched tightly, but his faceplates remained a noble, almost serene, mask. Tarn faltered, the frequencies falling out of alignment. He nearly switched his optics off, but endured; it would be a disservice to not share these final moments with his Lord. The frequencies re-synched, and Tarn continued on to the most pivotal passages.

“My weapon is my burden: a reminder of the path I was forced to take.”

Megatron’s frame convulsed as his calibration systems involuntarily attempted to reroute power from other functions to his fading spark. 

“When the word ‘weapon’ is emptied of meaning; when the purpose of a weapon is impossible grasp…”

Purple hands cradled the tyrant’s helm as his optics sputtered off, then back on, and off again, seeing nothing. His ventilations faltered to erratic rasps. 

“When the rejection of my weapon is of significance to no one other than myself…”

An intimate lullaby. Megatron’s helm lolled against Tarn’s palm.

“…Only then shall I remove it from my arm.”

Tarn leaned down, rested his helm on the table next to Megatron’s. His breath ghosted across the silver armor, though by now it was no doubt drained of the sensory capabilities needed to detect such a delicate touch. 

“Because only then will I have earned the right to rid myself of my burden.”

Megatron was very still now. The convulsions had ceased. His optics were dull sheets of glass. His frame was silent, devoid of the steady hum of life-systems. He was a statue. A memorial. Tarn exhaled a long, quavering ventilation as he sat up. The room looked different now, though he couldn’t pinpoint exactly how. Everything seemed dimmer. Further away. He fumbled with the fastenings of his mask; they were stuck, after being locked in place for vorns, and each one took some doing to loosen. One by one, they fell away with a series of soft clicks. 

Slowly, Tarn peeled the mask away. An air current brushed across his disfigured faceplates, tickling and alien. He studied the mask resting in his hands— the emblem of the great Cause, and the mech who embodied it, to which he’d given himself utterly. He’d annihilated his own identity to become an avatar of his Lord’s will. He didn’t know what his name had been. He didn’t know what he looked like. And it mattered even less now. 

Tarn laid the mask reverently in the center of Megatron’s chest, covering the ugly mark marring that stately silver armor. Then he released the bindings on Megatron’s limbs. Taking one dark hand in his own, Tarn lifted it to the scarred remains of his lips and brushed a kiss along the cold plating. He positioned Megatron’s arms to lay at his sides; like this, he appeared relaxed, as if he were in recharge. Peaceful at last. Tarn turned away then, unable to look at the lifeless frame on the table any longer. When the door to the interrogation room slid open again, Tarn was greeted by four shocked, horrified stares. 

“Lord Megatron is dead,” Tarn declared. 

The other DJD members swayed on their feet, nothing more than shadows.

“As of this moment, I resign from my captaincy of the Peaceful Tyranny. Kaon, as the ranking officer on board, you now have command,” Tarn continued in monotone. Kaon whimpered, then sobbed brokenly. 

Tarn walked away. Kaon tried to follow, but Helex restrained him. Dazed and numb, the tank wandered through the Peaceful Tyranny’s mostly empty cargo bay. Along the exterior wall, five emergency escape pods lay nestled in their launch tubes. Tarn shuffled toward them, movements listless and unsteady. He opened the hatch and climbed inside. He barely fit. With hands finally steady, he pulled the hatch shut and activated the emergency launch protocol. Alarms blared throughout the ship, but no one moved. Finally, Vos tore himself away and pressed his face to a small porthole, just in time to see a shooting star plummeting away from the ship, into the depths of unknown space.

 


End file.
